Ouachita County, Arkansas
Ouachita County is a county in Arkansas. The population of the county is 26,120. Major roads US Route 79 US Route 79B US Route 278 US Route 278B Arkansas Highway 4 Arkansas Highway 7 Arkansas Highway 9 Arkansas Highway 24 Arkansas Highway 57 Arkansas Highway 76 Arkansas Highway 205 Arkansas Highway 274 Arkansas Highway 332 Arkansas Highway 368 Arkansas Highway 376 Arkansas Highway 387 Geography Adjacent counties Calhoun County (east) Dallas County (north) Clark County (northwest) Union County (south) Columbia County (southwest) Nevada County (west) Demographics As of the 2010 U.S. Census, the racial composition of the county is: 55.92% White (14,606) 40.56% Black or African American (10,594) 3.52% Other (920) 23.0% (6,007) of Ouachita County residents live below the poverty line. Theft rate statistics Ouachita County has above average and somewhat high rates of Pokemon theft and murder, mainly in Camden. The county reported 30 Pokemon thefts in 2018, and averages 4.05 murders a year. Pokemon Communities Cities Bearden - 966 Camden - 12,183 Chidester - 287 Stephens - 891 Towns East Camden - 931 Louann - 164 CDPs Reader - 66 Unincorporated communities Amy Cullendale Frenchport Rendezvous Spring Hill Tates Bluff Climate Fun facts * Lumber was the driving force of Bearden’s economy. Four large lumber mills—the Cotton Belt mill, the Freeman-Smith Lumber Company, the Eagle Lumber Company, and the Stout Lumber Company—operated within six miles of the town from 1885 to 1930. At one point, the mills employed and supported more than 2,000 area men and their families. Most of the mill workers were farmers or sons of farmers. They would work the mills by day and the fields before and after work. While the success was long lasting, Bearden, like many communities in the early 1900s, experienced the results of unsound lumber practices. Many acres were cut and not replanted correctly or at all, resulting in a shift in milling. Even so, the town continued to prosper, but with fewer mills. The first mill to leave was in 1923. * Bearden has an annual Gazebo Festival, which was started in 1986 by Jackie Bevil and a gospel group singing in the park. Soon, they attracted a larger and larger audience each year and began to sell lunch boxes. This eventually grew into the Gazebo Festival, held the third weekend in June. * White Oak Lake and White Oak Lake State Park are located west of Chidester. * Chidester's school system was established quickly after the founding of the city. In 1949, the Reader (Nevada and Ouachita counties) schools were incorporated into the Chidester school system. During the first decades of the twentieth century, schools in Chidester were segregated, with white children attending the Chidester schools and black children attending the Pleasant Hill school in Chidester. The school leaders responded to the desegregation movement by declaring freedom of choice in 1967, which led to a few black students attending the Chidester schools but no white students enrolling in the Pleasant Hill school. In 1969, the schools were declared fully integrated, but four black teachers then sued the school district on the grounds that they were dismissed from their jobs during the desegregation process due to racial bias. Their suit reached the U.S. Appeals Court in 1971, which upheld their claim, while admitting that guidelines for retention or dismissal of teachers were vague. The Chidester schools were later consolidated into the Fairview School System in 1987, which was in turn combined with the Camden School System by court order in 1990. * Harrell Field is located in East Camden. * A small business district had developed in Louann before the discovery of a large field of oil in southern Ouachita and northern Union counties. Like its neighbor, Smackover, Louann exploded with population, as oil wells were built in and around the community. At least eight wells were dug within the town limits of Louann, which incorporated as a town in 1923. However, a combination of the decline of the oil boom and the Great Depression hit Louann rather hard, and the town hasn't really recovered from it. Category:Arkansas Counties